Friday, September 18, 2015

"NEWTOWN,
Conn. — The National Shooting Sports Foundation® (NSSF®) announced
today that it has been awarded a two-year, $2.4 million grant by the
U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). Funds will go toward providing firearm
safety education messaging and free gun locks through NSSF’s Project ChildSafe
program to communities throughout the country, to encourage responsible
firearm storage and help reduce firearm accidents, theft and misuse."

This
project has distributed over 36 million free gun locks to gun owners
along with literature to educate owners on safe storage of firearms.
However, as I said, someone isn't happy about government money going to
this project,

"Newtown,
CT−Two gun violence prevention groups, the Newtown Action Alliance and
Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, have launched a petition campaign
calling on the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to cancel a planned
$2.4 million grant to the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) and
find a more suitable partner for their gun violence prevention efforts.

On
September 10, 2015, the Newtown-headquartered NSSF announced that it
had received a two-year grant from DOJ to produce Project ChildSafe
Safety Kits, which the organization distributes to law enforcement
agencies around the country. The kits include a cable-style gun lock and
a brochure detailing gun safety procedures."

Now if the CSGV had some evidence that funds that were supposed to go
to go for gun locks was being spent to lobby congress,then they might
have a justifiable beef. But all I'm seeing is that someone they don't
approve of is getting some good PR for the very beneficial program that
provides real world and real time improvement in guns being safely
stored.

What does everyone here think of what seems to me to be a bad case of sour grapes?

One thing I think is this: the NSSF says child locks "help reduce firearm accidents, theft and misuse." I'd like to know how "a cable-style gun lock" would reduce theft.

Thursday, September 17, 2015

“What separates shooting sports from stick-and-ball sports is that
when it’s time for our kids to go to a tournament, all the kids can
compete — heavy, thin, tall, short, fast, slow, boy or girl — it doesn’t
make them any different,” Mr. Wondrash said. “That’s what really lends itself to our sport.”

The SSSF has programs in 42 states and has seen participation grow from about 6,000 students four years ago to 13,000 now, Mr. Wondrash said.

Competitive
shooting has become so popular and accepted in certain communities that
some high schools award varsity letters for trapshooting. National
organizations like the SSSF
help students assemble teams, train coaches to teach athletes how to
safely fire a gun and organize competitions and championships for teams.

A 16-year-old boy from Tulsa, Oklahoma was rushed to the hospital on
Monday after accidentally shooting himself in the leg. According to Tulsa World,
officers were called to the scene of the accident, a private residence,
and found the teen on a bed soaked with blood. Suspecting that the
bullet had severed an artery, officers quickly stopped the bleeding with
a tourniquet and had the boy transported to a hospital, where he was
listed in serious condition.

Strangely enough, the Tulsa Police Department claims that this is not
the first time the teen has been involved in an accidental shooting.
Roughly three months ago the boy had also shot himself in the leg with a
handgun. At the time, officers investigated the case but found the
injury to be not life-threatening. The department did not offer details
on the aftermath of the investigation but did say that the handgun was
confiscated and remained at the police station. Officials did not
specify if the teen or his parents will face any charges.

At least this time, the boy was fortunate that police arrived when they
did. Officials said in a news release that the teen was found conscious
but incoherent in his residence. The victim had lost a lot of blood,
which could cause dizziness, shortness of breath, and even hypovolemic
shock in more serious cases.

Wednesday, September 16, 2015

If
it takes a sensational statistic to spur national concern about such
self-destruction, consider the latest research showing that 82 percent
of teenage suicides by firearms involve guns left poorly secured or
foolishly unprotected by members of their families. These young lives
are impulsively lost in supposedly safe home environments, where just
the presence of a gun has been found to increase the risk of suicide
three times, according to a new report by the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, a gun safety organization.

The
report also notes that 85 percent of people attempting suicide by gun
succeed, while drug overdose, the main method chosen for suicide
attempts, is fatal only 2 percent of the time. Ninety percent of those
who fail in a suicide attempt embrace their second chance at life and do
not eventually die by suicide.

There
is stark evidence that easy access to guns compounds the crisis. The
states with the five highest rates of gun suicides have gun ownership
rates notably higher than the national average, according to the Brady
study. Meanwhile, the gun lobby and firearm industry are engaged in a
reckless campaign to have more Americans own and carry guns.

Local newsThe Santa
Clara County District Attorney’s Office has opted not to file criminal
charges against a veteran Gilroy police officer following a May incident
where his teenage stepdaughter shot herself in the leg with his
personal handgun.

Assistant District Attorney Cindy Hendrickson told the Dispatch
this week there was no evidence the officer—whose name was not
released—acted in disregard or indifference toward human life in storing
the firearm, which the law requires for a criminal negligence charge.The May 4 shooting on the 500 block of El Cerrito
Way was the result of “inattention or a mistake in judgment at most” on
part of the 13-year-old girl, Hendrickson said. The girl, not named due
to her age, gained access to a .22-caliber handgun belonging to the
officer, and shot herself in the leg around 3 p.m. It was not the
officer’s duty weapon and was registered as a personal firearm,
according to investigators.

“The facts suggest a confluence of events that
normally didn’t happen led to a tragic accident,” Hendrickson said,
adding that the unnamed officer “normally stored his personal firearm
safely.”

Tuesday, September 15, 2015

I ran across
this court judgment today regarding the decriminalization of marijuana
at the state level. It seemed particularly relevant in light of
Massachusetts being a state that has gotten a grade of A- from the Law
Center to Prevent Gun Violence. And this is something to be expected if
recreational marijuana is going to be legalized.

It seems as if Massachusetts did a pretty good job of writing their law
to insure that past offenses wouldn't be held against citizens for past
offenses.

Monday, September 14, 2015

A professor was killed in his office at Delta State University in
Mississippi, forcing terrified students and teachers to hunker down in
classrooms as investigators searched for another school employee in
connection with the killing, officials said Monday.

Cleveland Police Chief Charles
"Buster" Bingham said during a news conference that authorities have
identified Shannon Lamb as a "person of interest" in the shooting of
history professor Ethan Schmidt. Lamb is no longer believed to be on the
Delta State campus.

Bingham
also said police have information suggesting Lamb may have been involved
in another slaying in the south Mississippi city of Gautier, about 300
miles away.

Gautier police
spokesman Matthew Hoggatt told The Sun Herald (http://bit.ly/1gmKAle)
that a woman was found dead in her home, and that Lamb is the suspect in
her death.

"We're working
right now under the assumption that both events are related," Hoggatt
said. "We hope that they are not. But at this point in time, information
indicates that they probably are linked in some way, shape or form."

“Two other teens who were
present when the shooting occurred told deputies that the suspect fled
on foot into some nearby woods,” Selman-Willis said in an emailed
statement.

The suspect, identified as 18-year-old Kaleb
Oliver Greene, was located “several hours later” at a home in Houston
County. He has been charged with involuntary manslaughter, pointing a
gun at another and reckless conduct.